{"product_id":"the-nations-tortured-body-violence-representation-and-the-formation-of-a-sikh-diaspora-paperback","title":"The Nation's Tortured Body: Violence, Representation, and the Formation of a Sikh Diaspora - Paperback","description":"\u003cp\u003eby \u003cb\u003eBrian Keith Axel\u003c\/b\u003e (Author)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eThe Nation's Tortured Body\u003c\/i\u003e Brian Keith Axel explores the formation of the Sikh diaspora and, in so doing, offers a powerful inquiry into conditions of peoplehood, colonialism, and postcoloniality. Demonstrating a new direction for historical anthropology, he focuses on the position of violence between 1849 and 1998 in the emergence of a transnational fight for Khalistan (an independent Sikh state). Axel argues that, rather than the homeland creating the diaspora, it has been the diaspora, or histories of displacement, that have created particular kinds of places--homelands.\u003cbr\u003e\tBased on ethnographic and archival research conducted by Axel at several sites in India, England, and the United States, the text delineates a theoretical trajectory for thinking about the proliferation of diaspora studies and area studies in America and England. After discussing this trajectory in relation to the colonial and postcolonial movement of Sikhs, Axel analyzes the production and circulation of images of Sikhs around the world, beginning with visual representations of Maharaja Duleep Singh, the last Sikh ruler of Punjab, who died in 1893. He argues that imagery of particular male Sikh bodies has situated--at different times and in different ways--points of mediation between various populations of Sikhs around the world. Most crucially, he describes the torture of Sikhs by Indian police between 1983 and the present and discusses the images of tortured Sikh bodies that have been circulating on the Internet since 1996. Finally, he returns to questions of the homeland, reflecting on what the issues discussed in \u003ci\u003eThe Nation's Tortured Body\u003c\/i\u003e might mean for the ongoing fight for Khalistan.\u003cbr\u003e\tSpecialists in anthropology, history, cultural studies, diaspora studies, and Sikh studies will find much of interest in this important work.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eBack Jacket\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eHistorical anthropology at its best, The Nation's Tortured Body\" explores the history and politics of the Sikhs in a complex, and contested, transnational context. Axel's book evocatively charts the ways in which the crossing and marking of boundaries have shaped the foundational identities of a diasporic community, providing a graphic illustration of the multiple meanings of the idea of 'homeland' in our contemporary postcolonial world.\"--Nicholas B. Dirks, Columbia University\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eAuthor Biography\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBrian Keith Axel is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Swarthmore College. He is the editor of \u003ci\u003eFrom the Margins: Historical Anthropology and Its Futures, \u003c\/i\u003e also published by Duke University Press.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n        \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eNumber of Pages:\u003c\/strong\u003e 312\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eDimensions:\u003c\/strong\u003e 0.65 x 9 x 6 IN\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eIllustrated:\u003c\/strong\u003e Yes\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublication Date:\u003c\/strong\u003e February 28, 2001\u003c\/div\u003e\n            ","brand":"Books by splitShops","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42130247942279,"sku":"9780822326151","price":56.63,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0601\/2623\/2711\/files\/81fdf12f30f58884b9761ad2a0b483a1.webp?v=1732609539","url":"https:\/\/booksby.splitshops.com\/products\/the-nations-tortured-body-violence-representation-and-the-formation-of-a-sikh-diaspora-paperback","provider":"Books by splitShops","version":"1.0","type":"link"}